


This Rough Magic

by oceanofdarkness



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Rumbelle Secret Santa 2019 (Once Upon a Time)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:20:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21877264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oceanofdarkness/pseuds/oceanofdarkness
Summary: Rumplestiltskin has brought magic to a land never meant to have it.
Relationships: Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold
Comments: 31
Kudos: 24





	This Rough Magic

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ydnam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ydnam/gifts).



> This is a Rumbelle Secret Santa gift for @sydnam from the prompt "this didn't happen last time".  
> It is about as canon divergent as you can get, based on old speculation after the ending of the first season. I remember spending way too much time trying to work out how magic might behave in the land without magic and what that meant for Rumple’s curse. I was planning to write a long involved fic, but I didn’t get around to it before the second season started and my carefully constructed headcanon was immediately undermined. So the set up might have looked something like this. I hope it works these days as a nostalgic little stand alone.  
> If anyone wants to leave a comment and let me know what your headcanons and speculations were back in the day, I’d love to hear them.  
> Happy Rumbelle Christmas!

“Because magic is power.”

Belle looked at him for a long moment, almost frozen, and then she spun around and he felt her shoulders jerk away from the arm he had wrapped around her.

“Again? Honestly?” He heard the anguish in her voice, but it took him a moment to register what she was asking.

“No!” Panic fluttered in his chest, and he reached out to cradle her face in his hands. She didn’t pull away. He would take that as a good sign. “Belle, no. You don’t understand, sweetheart.”

She sighed and looked into his eyes.

“Then help me.”

His mind was racing. There was so much she didn’t know, so much he needed to tell her, to make her understand, and much of it would undoubtedly upset her before he could possibly hope to make any of this better... and then he realized, and cursed himself for a fool that it hadn’t been the first thing to occur to him.

He pulled her to him and kissed her.

Their first kiss all those years ago had been chaste, uncertain. Not this one. He crushed her mouth to his, fingers tangled in her hair. He kissed her with a wild desperation. All of the grief and loss and regret of decades were in that kiss, as well as the promise that he would never let her go again. She returned his kiss with equal fervor, her arms wrapping around his neck, pressing herself tight against him.

When they finally broke apart, she blinked in confusion.

“But, I don’t... how? How can you kiss me?”

He allowed himself a low chuckle.

“I didn’t summon my curse, sweetheart. I know of no power that could even if I should wish it. There is only one magic powerful enough to transcend realms.”

“True LOve,” she whispered, looking at him with a kind of grudging wonder. “You found a way to capture it, didn’t you? That’s what you threw down there.” She gestured absently at the well without taking her eyes from his.

“Yes,” he said simply, a note of pride in his voice... proud of himself or her understanding, or perhaps both. He struggled for a moment, choosing his words carefully. “Belle, there’s obviously much I must tell you...” and here he paused, stroking her hair and gazing at her intently “... and much you must tell me. I promise I _will_ answer all of your questions, but we have little time to finish what must be done before all seven hells break open. For now, what you need to know is that I love you truly, Belle. The magic I’ve brought to this land is not the choice you think it is. In this land, I can have both you and the magic I need to protect you. Can you trust me for just a little while?”

He felt her hand along his cheek.

“As long as I have your love and your promise to be truthful when we speak, Rumplestiltskin, you have whatever you need of me.”

Rumplestiltskin knew that he did not deserve this woman, but he would be damned even more than he already was if he was ever going to be the one to tell her that. He had no idea how long he would have to put protections in place now that the curse was broken, but he didn’t believe it would be long. Time was precious, but he couldn’t resist pulling Belle close again for one more kiss.

She could feel the magic flow around them, feel it wrap itself around the man in her arms like a cloak, feel it flow through her as it made its way to him. That didn’t happen last time. When they had kissed in the Enchanted Forest, the magic of the Dark One had fled from her. Oh, it had wrapped itself about Rumplestiltskin, but not like this. It had closed around him like the walls of a prison.

She knew the magic of the Dark One as well as she knew her own name. It had permeated everything in the place she had last called home... a hungry, demanding thing that Rumple had given himself to in their old land. This new magic offered itself to him instead. This magic he would claim. She did not understand exactly how this could be, but she would trust her sorcerer to explain once he had completed whatever he had begun here. For now, it was enough to feel his arms wrapped around her, see the love and wonder in his eyes when he pulled back from their kiss.

===========

They were settled safely in the big pink house on the edge of town by nightfall. Belle made her way downstairs in a cozy robe after an obsecenely long shower to find Rumplestiltskin perched on a stool by the fire with his spinning wheel in front of him. He was staring at the wheel and rubbing his fingers together in the nervous habit that Belle had found so endearing back in the Dark Castle, but it did not look as though he had begun to spin his gold.

He was lost to something in his own head, so much so that he didn’t notice when she came into the room, so she took the opportunity to stand in the doorway for a moment and study him. He was so different here in this land without magic, no longer the flamboyant imp she had come to love, constantly in motion unless he was at his wheel.This Mr. Gold was calm and sedate. There was a stillness about him that she would not have believed possible of her Rumplestiltskin if she had not seen it with her own eyes.

And he must have felt those eyes on him, because he looked up to find her standingjust inside the sitting room. She found herself suddenly shy to have been caught watching him.

“Nothing to forget?” she asked, nodding at the unused wheel.

He offered her a rueful smile, and shook his head.

“I believe I’ve promised to call upon my memories for you tonight, sweetheart, not chase them away.” And with that he rose from his stool and moved to where she stood, a gentle arm coming around her as he led her over to a plush sofa and encouraged her to sit before tucking a blanket about her. “The kettle should be just about ready. I’ll bring us some tea, and we can settle in for a talk, yes?” She nodded, and he moved away from her, leaving her to take in the room while he fetched a tray from the kitchen. He returned quicker than she expected, and she couldn’t keep the smile from her face as she saw the familiar chipped tea cup perched next to the steaming pot on the silver tray in his hands amidst the other cups and saucers.

“You kept it, my chipped cup.”

He smiled and set the tray down, lifting the cup and cradling it in his hands.

“I thought it was all I had left of you.” His voice was soft, barely a whisper. “She told me you died.”

“Oh Rumple!” She was on her feet, arms winding around him, and he buried his face in her wet curls. “I was on my way back to the castle when her men took me.”

“Back?” He pulled back to look at her. “You were coming back?”

“Yes, Rumple. I was coming home.”

“ _Home_.” There was wonder in his eyes. “Home... _to me_?”

“Of course to you. Where else would my home be?”

“Oh, Belle!"She was shocked to see the tears that gathered in the soft brown eyes of Mr. Gold. "I should never have sent you away. You’ve spent decades in a cell and it’s all my fault. I’m so sorry, sweetheart!”

“Rumple,” she soothed, “I shouldn’t have tried to break your curse without talking to you about it first. I just... I never thought that you wouldn’t want to be free of it.”

His expression changed to one of grim resignation.

“That is a long and complicated tale, I’m afraid.” He paused, looking pained as he went on. “But one I owe you nonetheless.” His discomfort was so strong it felt like it’s own presence there by the fire with them, and she took pity on him.

“And it’s one I want very much to hear,” she assured him, “but perhaps we should start with something a bit more immediate?”

Some of the tension left his rigid jaw and he offered her a small, grateful smile.

“I’ll try to tell you whatever you wish to know, sweetheart.”

“The magic you brought to this land, Rumplestiltskin. It felt so different from your magic before. How...” She struggled to form the question, but he thought he knew what she was trying to ask.

“The Queen’s curse brought us to a land without magic, Belle. My curse tethered me toa dark, elemental magic that was born in the Enchanted Forest. There’s no place for it here, nothing for it to draw on.”

“But why would she want such a thing? Was she so desperate to take your power from you that she would give her own to do it?”

Rumple shook his head. “No , sweetheart. Regina didn’t cast the curse to take my power. The price was far too high to pay for that.” He looked down, his jaw going rigid again. “The curse was the only way to reach this land, Belle.”

She studied him for a long moment, though he would not meet her eyes again, and the truth of it struck her with the force of a blow.

“She cast the curse for you?” There was no reproach in her voice, only a need to understand. After a long moment he looked up at her, an obvious plea in his eyes that she not judge him too harshly.

“She cast the curse for herself... but it did serve my interests,” he admitted. And because he had promised her honesty he continued. “I created the curse, Belle, and gave it to Regina.”

“Why not simply cast it yourself?” she asked. He arched an eyebrow, surprised that this was the question she thought to ask in response to his confession.

“The price for casting it was one I could not pay,” he said simply.

She answered with a slight nod, and another response that took him by surprise.

“You didn’t need to travel to this land to break your curse or you would have let it happen when we shared True Love’s kiss. You knew coming here would cost you your magic, but you were willing to sacrifice it.” She almost seemed to be talking to herself as she reasoned it out. “Whatever brought us to this land must be very important to you, Rumplestiltskin. Is that why you were so determined to hold onto your power, to insure that the curse would be cast to bring us here?”

He simply stared at her in astonishment for a long moment then dropped his eyes from hers again before answering with a mumbled “yes” and then after a pause, “Belle, I’m so sorry, sweetheart. There was no other way.”

Her gasp brought his eyes back up to hers, and she held them with an unsettling intensity.

“ _Your son_ ,” she breathed. “You said he was lost, and I thought you meant that he had died, but that wasn’t true was it? You lost him to this land where your magic couldn’t follow.” His mouth tried to move, but no sound escaped him. It wasn’t really necessary though, because Belle could see the truth of it in everything about him. “It truly is a story you’ve owed me for some time, Rumplestiltskin.” She fought back the urge to claim the tale she was due immediately, knowing that it’s telling would put an end to any further discussion for the rest of the evening once it was done. Rumple nodded, but had no chance to speak before she went on. “I’d still like to understand what we did this afternoon before you tell me about him if you don’t mind?”

“Of course!” He agreed readily and his relief was once again painfully apparent.

“The magic you brought here,” she began, “how will it work in a land not meant to have it?”

“I’m not entirely sure,” he admitted. “There is much I must learn to fully understand it or even hope to make use of it. The curse of the Dark One put magic at my fingertips in our land, Belle. It took me over a century of study to understand how magic might be gathered and manipulated without benefit of being tethered to it as I was, and I never had the opportunity to practice such a thing without my curse interfering. The protections we put in place this afternoon were possible because of the artifacts we used to channel this young magic, to buy time until I can learn to summon it properly.”

So many questions crowded into her mind, but the first she voiced was a practical one.

“Can the Queen summon it? She learned magic in the Enchanted Forest, yes? Does that mean she’ll know how to use it here without the practice you need?”

“No,” he assured her. “Regina has no power here, sweetheart. Not without considerably more time and effort than I should need. I’m not certain it’s even possible forher to call on magic born of true love after casting the curse. She can’t hurt you, Belle. I won’t let her.”

Belle nodded thoughtfully.

“Rumple, I felt the magic out in the woods. It was drawn to you. It passed through me on it’s way to you.”

He smiled and reached out a hand, brushing the backs of his fingers across her cheek. “True Love’s kiss,” he said simply. She felt the blush rise to her cheeks and offered him a shy smile.

“Magic is summoned and focused with strong emotion, Belle. I wanted so badly to protect you, to do what I failed to before. That desire called it to me, but it didn’t seek me out because it was bound to me, not in the way I could command the magic in our land. I’ll need to learn to court magic here.”

“Court the magic,” she repeated, turning the concept over in her mind as he went on.

“The Enchanted Forest was _built_ on magic, Belle. It was in everything. It will be some time before this fledgling magic truly takes hold here, and never in the way it might have in a land meant to nurture it. It will be elusive at first I suspect, and I will need to learn the proper language to call upon it. I’m accustomed to using darker emotions than this magic is likely to respond to. The magic that my curse bound me to was a dark, chaotic thing with the force of nature behind it. When I was first tethered to it, I was more conduit than master. It did my bidding well enough when strong emotion directed it, but it took me centuries to learn to control it. I flatter myself to think that should give me some advantage in mastering a more accommodating power, but there will still be much to learn. In the meantime, we can take comfort in the fact that no one else here in Storybrooke should be able to make use of it either.”

“Surely the fairies...” Belle began, but she stopped at the pure hatred that flooded his eyes.

“Those pesky little insects likely won’t be able to summon it even with practice.” The smirk that accompanied this declaration was decidedly unkind. Belle was convinced there was yet another tale to be told there, but it would have to wait for another time. “The only magic they could call on in our land was embedded in the fairy dust found in the mines; and even steeped in it, they required wands to command it. No, I doubt the fairies will be bringing magic to the convent any time soon,” he finished with smug satisfaction.

“Why bother to bring magic to this land at all then, Rumplestiltskin?”

“Even if I didn’t need it to find Baelfire, “ he began, “I have had centuries to make enemies and cultivate a certain reputation, Belle. To be powerless in this land now that the curse has broken is to court disaster.”

She could certainly see the logic in what he said and found that she was not inclined toargue the necessity of having the means to navigate this new terrain safely. Her time with the Queen had taught her that lesson well enough. And now that she felt she had a grasp of their current situation, it was time to turn her attention to understanding how they found themselves in it.

She took Rumplestiltskin’s hand and led him to sit beside her in front of the fire.

“Alright, Rumplestiltskin.” She reached out to take the tea pot from the tray and poured a bit of still warm tea into the chipped cup, fixing it the way he preferred before offering it to him. “I believe you owe me a story.”

He nodded, wrapping his hands about the cup and holding it as though it were a lifeline to a drowning man.

“Tell me about Baelfire." Belle encouraged him gently, trying out the newly discovered name of the boy Rumplestiltskin had torn a world apart to find. "Tell me about your son.”


End file.
